sidered a failure. Another party drilled a well at Wroxeter. I do not know much about the log of that well, but I know they did not get salt. After that another man drilled a well three quarters of a mile south of where we did and within the corporation of Brussels, and he got salt. That shows the town to be on

district.
Port Franks.

the edge of the salt bed. Of course there is plenty of salt for manufacturing purposes, though not as much as here. The salt was got there a little nearer the surface than at Seaforth. To the north-west they drilled at Kincardine and got The Kincardine salt; at Port Elgin they drilled but did not get salt, as also at Southampton. Mr. Williams of this town owns a well at Port Franks, 40 miles south of here. We can trace the salt bed all the way from here to Marine City in Michigan. At Parkhill Parkhill, they drilled a well and got the same salt bed as we have. The well is a good one but is not being used. At Petrolia also, as well as at Bothwell, they have the same Petrolia. salt bed as we have, but more of it. There it is under the petroleum, and deeper than here. The basin gets deeper and there is more salt towards the south; probably the great basin is under the state of Ohio. The salt rock at Goderich is 950 feet below the level of the lake. At Courtright they have to go down 1,500 or 1,600 feet to get the same salt bed, showing that it dips in that direction, and extends all the way. Across the St. Clair river from Courtright there are two or three wells, and there are several from there south towards Detroit. The whole of that

Courtright.

manufactures on

section of the country is underlaid with salt. In sinking wells at Courtright and Advantages of St. Clair they had the benefit of our twenty years' experience. They drilled their St. Clair river. wells on the bank of the river, and that is a grand place for commerce. A hundred vessels pass there for one that comes here, and they can get a great deal cheaper freights. There is no teaming and no labor in loading; the salt is loaded right on the vessels. They can make their salt cheaper than we can. The day is passed when reciprocity in salt would benefit Canada. Salt has not been found at Saginaw, Saginaw. but I think it is there at a greater depth. It is said that a well was sunk near Detroit. Detroit which went through salt three or four times thicker than ours. Manistee they got salt, but of course at a greater depth than here. They have Manistee. been manufacturing it very cheaply there, as from the waste of their sawmills they get all the fuel they need.

At

the vicinity of

H. Kittredge-I drilled six wells north and south of Glencoe; the deepest was 560 feet. We got a very slight show in that well, so slight that it could hardly be Oil borings in called a show of oil. The character of the rock was very similar to what it is near Glencoe. Petrolia. The first rock we got in all of those wells was black shale; below the black shale we got streaks of limestone, streaks of slate and soapstone, and then a similar formation to that we have here. Generally there were two large veins of soapstone with a layer of limestone between the two, known here as the middle, upper and lower limestone. After that we got into the hard rock which was continuous. Oil could not be found there at the same depths as here.

When we Boring for oil at

Duncan Sinclair-We strike limestone rock here at about 100 feet. In some places it is 35 or 40 feet thick, and there are streaks of soapstone in it. go through that we strike about 120 feet of soapstone; it is soft and of the nature Petrolia. of blue clay. Below that is the middle lime. It averages from 15 to 18 feet and is not very hard; it is a kind of a grey limestone. Below that we strike the lower soapstone; it is like shale and there is about 40 feet of it. Then we get 70 or 80 feet of hard lime rock again, harder than the middle lime rock. After we get to 400 feet the stratum is between a limestone and a sandstone, and is soft. That generally runs to a depth of 465 or 480 feet; then we get the oil rock. It is a brown kind of rock, very soft and porous. I have seen some that looked like honey comb. Sometimes we find crevices in it, and the tools drop. The largest wells we had here were found in crevices, but there are no big wells got in the crevices now. Hon. J. Baxter-On the bank of the Grand river four miles south of Cayuga my brothers own a quarry. It is a limestone, but is magnesian and is not good for lime. Under that bed there is a layer of stone that could be manufactured into cement. Some years ago a quantity was burned in an ordinary limekiln. Only a few barrels were made, but it worked as well as the Thorold, and very much like it. The stone is grey and brown in color; a considerable quantity was quarried as building stone and they get blocks from twelve to fifteen inches thick; it has been used at Dunnville. The quarry extends along the bank of the river about half a mile. The stone does not stand the weather as well as the sandstone; it is more liable to crumble. About three miles from Ridgeway there is corniferous limestone. It is extensively used in making lime, and makes a first class article, very white, and about the same quality as the Beachville lime.

Cement stone on
Grand river.

Limestone.

The region

north of lake Nipissing.

Temagami

district.

Pyrites.

Copper.

Roofing slate.

Iron.

Timber.

LAKE TEMAGAMI REGION.

Edward Haycock-I am a civil engineer and mine owner, and my residence is at Ottawa. I have explored the country around Cross lake, where I saw galena and copper. The lake is in the Huronian formation, to the north of lake Nipissing. Six miles south of the lake one strikes the Laurentian formation. All the discoveries of minerals in that section occur in the Huronian rocks. I found galena, carrying a good deal of silver, and in the same vein copper and a good deal of gold. The vein was from two to six or seven feet wide. It occurs in the trap rock, the country rock being clay slate. Where the vein runs into the water it appears to be Minerals in the pretty solid; it is about five or six feet wide, and may be seen under the water for some distance. On the island it is very much split up and distributed through various crevices of the rock. Just above Cross lake, on lake Temagami, I saw a great deal of mineral; it was principally on the south-east side of the lake. I saw a great deal of iron pyrites in deposits, but I do not think I saw a vein at all. It was pretty pure pyrites-as pure as I have ever seen it. I had some of it assayed and the reports went from 5 dwt. to 3 oz. and 4 oz. of gold to the ton. Some of the deposits were very large. One into which I put a few blasts I should say was five feet wide, and it has been traced a little over half a mile, all solid pyrites. There is a great quantity there in the vicinity of the lake, but it is too far from a railway. The only hope is that the James Bay railway may go on, and if so it would pass. close by. The rock where this pyrites occurs is slate. Some of the deposits are associated with trap; the country rock is clay slate. On the north-east side of lake Temagami are some small showings of copper in quartz veins. The country has never been prospected or examined properly, and no doubt when it is large deposits will be found. The copper is in bunches in the quartz. I saw one vein about two or three feet wide. The islands upon the lake are full of minerals. There is a fine true roofing slate upon that lake, and enough of it to supply the whole continent. The same slate is seen again upon the Matabechawan, which empties into lake Temiscaming upon the Ontario side. The slate is exposed and there is a very large extent of it; it is a kind of grey-green. It splits into all thicknesses, from the eighth of an inch up. I have not seen the iron deposits in that region, but beautiful specimens have been brought to me by the Indians, both of hematite and red specular. The Indians say the deposits are very large. There is any quantity of timber, and that is one of the difficulties in exploring, the timber and moss covering the land. It is small stuff, such as poplar, jack pine, small red pine and white birch. It had once been burned over. The land around the lake is not good for farming; there are a few spots that would make good farms, but only a few; it is nearly all rock-I am speaking of the country just around the lake. From Temagami lake is a stream that empties into the Montreal river called the Temagami branch. There are two outlets from lake Temagami, the Sturgeon which flows into lake Nipissing, and the one which empties into the Montreal river. On that branch I have taken up six north of Tema- claims. On those claims we got galena carrying from 8 up to 64 oz. of silver to the ton. We got copper running from 18 up to 35 per cent., and one assay of galena gave us 54 to 64 per cent. of lead. We also got magnetic iron on the same property. We have one copper vein between ten and twelve feet wide, and galena veins from six inches up to fourteen feet wide. The copper veins are all sulphurous; they are quartz with a little spar. It is yellow copper ore, but there is a good deal of peacock copper in the large veins. Nearly all the veins have more or less copper; there are four in which the copper predominates, and they strike north-east and south-west, the dip being at about an angle of 45° to 60°. All the veins dip the same way and run the same way. We have one vein between 12 and 15 feet wide, which has been traced 200 feet. It runs about 40 per cent. of mineral, in which there is from 6 to 62 oz. of silver to the ton; that is the largest vein. We have gone down about 10 or 12 feet on one or two of the veins; they are in trap, the country rock being slate; the veins cut through the trap. Dr. Bell has seen a couple of them and he says they are true fissure veins. There is no doubt but that it will pay to work some of the large ones. I intend to put on a large gang of men next year; and if the veins prove as good below as they seem to promise, I shall put up a couple of furnaces. We have plenty of charcoal, and all the flux necessary, and we will smelt for silver, lead and copper. We have got traces of gold, but I have not found anything sufficient to consider valuable. I know of a great many other veins, some of which I intend to take up next year, but before doing so I want to put in a couple of shots to see how they look below; if they are good I shall take them up. They are all in the same district. The country is.

Mineral veins

gami lake.

A country full of minerals.

full of minerals there, but what is wanted is practical men to explore it. One man can do but very little in a wooded country like that. I think gold will be found. I have found it in different places, where it ran from 5 dwt. up to 3 and 4 oz. I have found it all the way from Cross lake up to the height of land in connection with copper and other minerals. We saw a great deal of jasper in the conglomerates. The formation is the Huronian. I have got asbestos from half an inch to nine inches long, but I cannot say whether there is much of it as it has not been opened up yet. One of the veins shows about a foot wide; those are veins in trap, running in the same direction as the quartz veins. In some there appears Asbestos. to be nothing but asbestos, but nothing has been done at all except to scrape off the moss. I suppose there are seven or eight of those veins there. I found asbestos up at the height of land, in serpentine rock. Up the Montreal river I found rich copper too; there is one vein there which the Indians told me they traced a mile and a half, but I did not go over it. The Indians brought some of the ore to me; it is very rich. At Round lake we strike a splendid tract of farming land. There are a couple of good Indian farms there now; it is a kind of loam, a warm soil. A tract of good The timber is balsam, birch and spruce; it is all second growth. There is a great farming land. depth of soil. I suppose there is between five and six inches of black soil. The subsoil is loamy clay; take it in your fingers and it will pulverise. That stretch is between 20 and 30 miles long and 6 to 8 miles wide. There is no large timber upon it. The Indians grow splendid crops, potatoes especially, but they do not sow grain at all. I saw turnips there half the size of my hat. I do not know what time the season opens, but I got potatoes on my way down, and when I arrived here they were only coming in. At Matatchewan, still further up, the Hudson Bay company grows splendid crops of barley. There is not much good land around the trading post, but further up the Hudson Bay people tell me there is a still better tract of farming land. The whole of the country from Cross lake to the height of land near the boundary between Quebec and Ontario is a mineral country. It is all in the Huronian formation, except here and there a spur of the Laurentian. I think over the height of land we may strike coal. I have met a good many people who say they have seen it, but I think it is lignite. That country wants a railway, and Railway when it gets it there will be immense mining work carried on. The mineral is facilities needed. there; mineral that will pay to move. What is wanted is a railway; a colonisation road would not answer.

Coal.

J. C. Bailey-I am a civil engineer, and have been employed in railway surveying in this country and the United States all my life. I have explored portions of northern Ontario. I located the Northern and Pacific Junction railway between Gravenhurst and lake Nipissing. I am chief engineer of the Ontario and Sault Ste. Marie railway, and have been all the way through the North Shore two or three times. I have also spent a good deal of time in the country north of lake Huron and lake Nipissing, and I have explored that section of country between lakes Nipissing and Temiscaming. I have just returned from exploring the section of country between lake Nipissing and lakes Temagami and Temiscaming for the Nipissing Region of counand James' Bay railway, being chief engineer of that road. We were away on that try explored. trip fifty or sixty days. We went in a north-westerly direction from North Bay till we arrived at lake Temagami We then went easterly toward lake Temiscaming, where the Montreal river joins the lake. Then we turned southerly, keeping to lake Temiscaming, but gradually getting away from it to the Government road. We came right through on the road to North Bay. The general character of the country from North Bay to lake Temagami is rolling land, with a good depth of soil From North Bay and very little rock. We could see the soil along the streams, and in nearly every to lakeTemacase there was about three feet of thick black loam with a clay subsoil. We could gami. tell we were in a good country by the timber. There was very little exposure of rock where the land was good, although along the lakes and rivers there were rounded rocks, but no: as in Muskoka. From North Bay to Rabbit lake the formation is Laurentian, but beyond that it is Huronian. In many places the country is covered with moss. In all the flats, however, there is a good extent of soil. On the rounded hills the country is thickly wooded with Norway pine. We also found a good deal of white pine in that region, and some splendid flats of sugar maple, as well as a good deal of black and yellow birch. I measured some of the pine, which Soil and timber. proved to be 20, 30 and even 40 inches in diameter. We also observed a greal deal of what the lumbermen call the "cork pine," which is the best variety of white pine. In some places it is mixed with birch, but generally the pine prevails. The best pine I saw was on good rich land, a sort of sandy loam. The pine forests are very

wan river.

A broad reach

timber.

Settlers.

thick about lake Temagami and around by Rabbit lake. However, it is almost impossible to transport the timber by water. There are plenty of streams there, but practical lumbermen say there are too many falls to admit of timber being floated down. We went down the Matabechawan, and along that river there is the finest On Matabecha Norway pine I ever saw. I measured a lot of it 36 inches through. Coming down by the Government road from lake Temiscaming to North Bay the land was excellent, but five miles south of Montreal river it was very rough. After that, however, there was a reach of seventy or eighty miles of splendid land. The timber in that region is of good land and mainly white pine, black and yellow birch, and there is a large extent of beautiful spruce and tamarac. The largest birch trees I saw were from three to three and a half feet through. They grow to a height of seventy or eighty feet. Out of some of these trees you should get on an average three good logs of say twelve feet in length. The tamarac is sometimes found 24 inches in diameter, but a good average would be 15 or 20 inches. The smaller size, 10 or 12 inches through, is used for ties. There are also patches of good young second growth poplar growing on land that had been burnt. We also found lots of maple, the trees running from 10 to 20 inches through. We saw considerable white ash, growing up to fifty or sixty feet and about twelve inches in diameter, and it commanded admiration. We noticed some whitewood, too, such as formerly grew in the Lake Erie counties; it grows from 24 to 30 inches in diameter and is very handsome. I may say that we met with these various timbers both going up and coming down. Coming down the Jocko river we found a French Canadian who had settled on 200 acres and had several stacks of hay cut. He had been there only twelve months or so, and had gone into the cattle raising business. Another settler, a German, showed me some immense potatoes he had grown there. There are no settlers on lake Temagami, but the Hudson Bay company have a post on Bear island, which has been established about seventy or eighty years. There are about fifty or sixty persons in the post, including women and children. There is good fishing in the lake, principally whitefish and salmon trout, and various other posts of the company are supplied with fish from there. Potatoes and corn are grown on Bear island. During my whole trip I saw no snow more than three feet deep along the river. An Indian told me that the snow was seldom any deeper, and that the winters were not often colder. The atmosphere is dry, and the cold is not felt as severely as down here. I had not a very good opportunity of examining the country for minerals, it being winter, but there were indications of hematite iron on Tomiko river, and I was told by an intelligent Indian named Bocage, who was hunting with me, that there was lead also. I also noticed some quartz veins in the rocks. The Indians told me that there was copper all around Temagami, both east and west, and we had specimens of lead and copper from that region. There has not been much exploration, but from the nature of the rocks I believe it must be rich in minerals. Already settlers and investors are turning their eyes toward that region. A couple of weeks ago I wrote a letter to the newspapers describing the country, and a few days afterwards I was informed that several American gentlemen were purchasing maps of that district and making more particular enquiries about the mineral deposits there. I am satisfied that as regards soil and climate that country is well suited for agricultural purposes. Mr. Nevin, who has surveyed the townships north of lake Temiscaming, has said in his report that out of five townships there would not be over 100 acres of bad land. A nunnery has been built there, and there are many French Canadians going in for settlement. In the latter part of February we found the common house fly in our tent, and in March and April yellow butterflies were flying about. We also heard the rosignol, the Canada bird and the swamp robin in the last named months, and crows were very common all through the winter. The country is full of moose; they are there by thousands. They used to tread the roads so heavily that it made travelling by snow-shoes very difficult for us. We often saw them playing on the ice, and sometimes came across their stamping grounds. We also tracked the cariboo, and the Indians say there are plenty of them. There are red deer there too, and we often came across wolves. There is an abundance of fur bearing animals, such as the beaver, marten, fox, mink and

A favorable climate.

Indications of minerals.

Fauna of the region.

Copper discoveries.

otter.

SUDBURY REGION,

James Stobie-About three years ago, in 1885, I discovered the Stobie copper mine; it is on the south part of 5 in the 1st of Blezard. I opened it up and sold it to the Canada Copper Co. I am now interested in a location with a deposit of copper on the north half of 6, in the 1st of Blezard. There has been only a little blasting

done upon it, but there appears to be a very large quantity of ore. There is gold and silver on a property I own on lot 10, in the 6th of Creighton. I discovered it in the latter part of July, 1885, but did not do any work upon it till recently. The principal matter of the vein is iron pyrites, with more or less galena, and some quartz, but not in a solid mass; there is black slate on both sides. The assays, made from specimens taken up at random, showed silver $11 and gold $7 to the ton. The galena is in fine particles, and seems to be mixed with the iron in the vein to a great extent. A slaty rock generally accompanies copper deposits. In Denison the rocks are somewhat similar to what they are at Sudbury, but there are some there that are not here. As a general thing I would follow diorite for copper. I do not think you will get much copper without the diorite. I am told it goes to the gneiss and stops there. The diorite that most people fancy is that near the gneiss, but I do not think the gneiss has much to do with the copper. I consider that in the Sudbury district copper exists in paying quantities, and that there is a large amount of gold in Denison. There is no good iron ore in this range that I have seen; there is too much sulphur. I have found boulders here and further north with good ore. In the country from Killarney to Sault Ste. Marie we find iron between quartzite and diorite; the quality is very good there, and important discoveries will, I think, yet be made in that section.

district.

R. R. Hedley—I have been out on the ground where prospectors had made discoveries, and took samples for myself and found gold. Those lots were in Gold in Sudbury Lorne, and are the only ones I can be sure of. On the surface of one property I found matter that assayed as high as four ounces; from another adjoining that I selected stuff that runs away up in the hundred ounces. In connection with the first there was considerable pyrites; the last was free milling. I have examined many specimens for different parties yielding low results, from two to twelve pennyweights.

F. L. Sperry-I am a chemist, and have been living in this country abont three years, engaged in professional work. I think copper and iron exist in paying Copper, nickel quantities in this section; nickel seems to occur in the iron. I suppose I have and iron. made 400 or 500 assays for different parties all the way from Toronto to lake Winnipeg. The majority from this district were of iron, nickel, copper and sulphur.

P. C. Campbell-I think gold, silver, platinum, zinc, nickel, tin, copper and iron exist in the district between Sault Ste. Marie and Sudbury in paying quan- Minerals in the tities. Tin has been found in two cases mixed with other ores on the copper range. Sault and Sudbury districts. There were no indications of tin in the first instance, but it was found as the work went down. I cannot say certainly that it will turn out to be in paying quantities, nor can I say that nickel or zinc is in paying quantities; the other metals I have mentioned I think are.

SAULT STE. MARIE REGION.

tains.

Thomas Frood-The sand in the front of the Wallace mine property carries small but distinctly appreciable quantities of gold. In five or six places where Minerals in the Williams, the Cornish miner, dug into the hill, small particles of free gold were La cloche mounfound. As yet no large quantity has been discovered. We have not come upon any veins carrying free gold, but we have met with galena mixed with iron in several places. The country rock of the Lacloche mountains is quartzite cut by bands of diorite. In some cases these bands are parallel to the mountain; sometimes they are angling across; and this diorite always shows some metal, generally pyrites. I have been told that in places where the diorite is cut by quartz, free silver and copper have been found. Lumbermen have brought specimens from the north slope of the Lacloche mountains of good galena. In the bands we generally find iron pyrites, copper pyrites, arsenical pyrites, small quantities of specular iron and galena, but no precious metals. During the last few years I have done a great deal of prospecting from the Thessalon to the Mattawa, and Algoma and from my observations I do not think there is a square mile in that distance in Nipissing diswhich mineral may not be found in appreciable quantities. Along the shores of the Georgian bay and on to the height-of-land will be found belts of mineralbearing rock. Within the last eighteen months the country is beginning to be better known, and more prospectors are around than ever before. It is only now people are commencing to recognise the possibilities of this section, and that is the reason that more work has not been done here in the past; but as soon as capitalists fully realise the mineral wealth of the Algoma and Nipissing districts there will

tricts.